Women, drinking, gambling. As nights out go, seeing Jeffrey Bernard Is Unwell at the Garrick is right up there with Ant and Dec’s stag do for Bacchanalian excess. Swigging from a bottle of vodka throughout, Tom Conti’s Jeffrey Bernard is an urbane alcoholic raconteur, recounting his tales of a life lived with a lingering regret that is never close enough to the surface to spoil a good alcohol-hazed yarn.
Bernard, for the uninitiated, was a journalist of the old school. Long liquid lunches, endless reams of acquaintances and crippling hangovers which often led to unwritten columns, hence the title of the play. Infuriating to editors – he lost his job on Sporting Life after vomiting in front of the Queen Mother – but beloved to readers for his wit, insight and unflinchingly honest depiction of roaring 60s Soho, Bernard was one of a kind. A man ill equipped to deal with anything as perfunctory as day-to-day life or a stable relationship, and yet utterly aware of his own failings.
Keith Waterhouse’s script revolves around a morning after the night before, with Bernard locked in his favourite Soho boozer, the Coach And Horses, having fallen asleep in the gents. As he waits for famously rambunctious landlord Norman to let him out, he slips into reminiscing his rollercoaster life, from his early forays into theatre, to falling out with his various wives, via having his collar felt by the law for illegal bookmaking.
Essentially a one man show, Conti is perfectly cast as the amiable rogue, all knowing glances and raised eyebrows at the ridiculousness of life and his inability to stop being led into temptation from every angle. The supporting set of roles are played out with aplomb, whether playing the women in his life – ‘You make me sick Jeff’ – or drinking and gambling buddies, Bernard revelling in his self-made role as friend to Soho’s wastrels, be them actors, aristocracy or alchies.
Underpinning the lunacy of Swinging London is the poignant sight of man steadily losing his friends to the ravages of age, drink or a lit cigarette in bed and maybe, just maybe, hinting that he would have liked to have done things differently. All of which makes this a West End staple with legs. Which is more than you could say for Jeff Bernard.
Sounds like a despicable character. That last one-liner was definitely, below the belt. :-(.
Posted by: The Gambler | 22/06/2006 at 04:29 PM